Toward the Sea of Freedom (62 page)

Indeed, Ian was thinking feverishly. Should he admit his disgrace? Confess that Kathleen had left him, perhaps even to look for this rat she had always loved? And perhaps she had even come close: that reverend was riding her mule. Had he really bought it in Christchurch? Ian inhaled sharply.

“Kathleen is dead,” he said, almost casually. “She died giving birth to Colin.” He indicated the boy outside. “Before that, your bastard almost killed her. She wasn’t made for delivering babies. Too weak, too delicate. That first boy was delivered dead. Yours isn’t good blood, Drury. Mine’s a model lad, however.” Ian laughed again. “No hard feelings, Drury.” He turned and walked out the door.

Michael stood there as if turned to stone. Kathleen was dead. Kathleen and his son. All those dreams, all those years. But that did not explain why Father O’Brien had written what he did—about the three children and Kathleen’s good life. Surely the priest had not wanted to lie to him. He must have misunderstood something and then lost contact with the Coltranes. Kathleen was dead. Michael felt sick. He left the bank slowly. He did not want to encounter Ian and his son under any circumstances. Kathleen’s son, Ian’s son—but his own child was dead.

Michael’s thoughts turned in a circle. He stared straight ahead as he rode through Tuapeka. He couldn’t even answer the greetings acquaintances called to him.

Kathleen was dead, Kathleen was dead. It was too much to believe.

Michael exhaled as he left Tuapeka behind and rode upriver. But he did not want to see Chris now either. He got down from his horse and sat on one of the rocks on the riverbank. He let his thoughts drift back to the little beach on the Vartry River, the willow whose branches kissed the water. Michael took leave of his beloved, his child, and his dream.

Several days later, Lizzie returned.

“What kinds of faces are those to make?” she asked when she saw the men sitting, glum and quiet, by the fire in the cabin.

Chris was whittling a wooden spoon. Before Michael had gone to Tuapeka, Chris had been working on a rocking horse. He occasionally sold toys in Tuapeka, where there were now parents who could afford a little luxury for their children. In the last few days, however, Michael had brusquely asked Chris to put away the rocking horse whenever he entered the house. He could not stand to look at toys, let alone think of children.

Chris understood. The little horse reminded him of a similar one he had whittled in Wales for his children. Both men gave in to their sorrow over lost time, although Michael could at least attempt to distract himself. He worked from morning until dusk, exerting himself to wring at least a little gold from the stream near their house. That day, he had been outside until midday, but it was raining so hard that, at some point, he gave up. Now he was trying to warm himself by the fire.

Lizzie’s presence seemed to brighten the cabin. She beamed as she carefully drew a pouch and a jade object from the pocket of her soaked-through coat and placed them on the table. Only then did she throw off her coat and step close to the fire to warm up.

“I don’t suppose you’ve got the whiskey out?” she asked, breaking the somber silence. So far, the men had not been able to manage more than a curt greeting.

“Really, what we need is champagne . . . What’s gotten into you two? Michael, Chris? Aren’t you happy I’m back? Did something happen? Well, no matter; you’ll be astonished in a moment.” Lizzie took the pouch from the table and crouched between the men.

“Take a deep breath, you two,” she announced happily. “Wait, one moment; close your eyes.”

“Lizzie, enough with the games.” Michael’s voice sounded pained. Lizzie’s concern grew. But this was her moment. The men would just have to cheer up. “Fine, then you’ll just risk being blinded.”

She gently took Michael’s hand and sprinkled some gold dust into it. Then she did the same with Chris.

Immediately Chris’s eyes grew wide. He couldn’t believe what he saw. “But, but, Lizzie, that’s gold.”

Lizzie laughed. “It sure is. About nine ounces. But about two ounces of it don’t belong to us. I’ll explain later. More importantly, I panned it in just one day. Without breaking a sweat. Or getting up early. The spot is not that far. We just need to go west, then upstream to the waterfall. Really, it’s a triangle with our cabin, the Maori village, and the gold. By my estimates we could take about a hundred ounces without destroying anything. But it has to stay a secret. That’s what I promised the Ngai Tahu.”

Michael stared without really seeing the gold in his hand. He was rich. Now he was finally rich. But also alone. Or free? He felt Lizzie’s gaze rest upon him. Finally, he overcame himself and looked her in the eye. Lizzie was lovely with the good fortune she was so willing to share with others.

“This gold, though, is for you first, Chris,” she said. “You can exchange it tomorrow and send the money to Ann. It should be enough for her passage. By the time she gets here, we should have more, much more. Michael, we’ll have our farm. With maids and manor and whatever else we want.”

Michael warmed himself on her smile, and he suddenly noticed his sorrow beginning to fall away. Kathleen and the child were the past. But Lizzie was there. Generous, full of life, and determined to make him happy. Up to then, he had given her back much too little. He had been trapped in an unrealistic dream.

Michael carefully slid the gold back into its pouch. Then he stood up and took Lizzie by the arms. For the first time, she did not resist, as if she also sensed that something had changed.

“Chris,” Michael said, checking over his friend. Aye, he looked to be in good enough shape; he could manage the trip to town. “Perhaps, perhaps you ought to ride straight to town to redeem the gold? You could bring some champagne for Lizzie and . . .”

Chris looked from Michael to Lizzie and smiled. He, too, seemed to think himself capable of the ride. “Surely it’s not good to keep so much gold in the house,” he said. “Especially since neither of us could hit a barn door at ten paces with the rifle. It’s stopped raining, anyway.”

Chris put on his warmest clothes, took the pouch from the table, and carefully put it in his pocket.

“Maybe I’ll have another drink in town too,” he said with a smile and a wink.

Lizzie and Michael nodded. “And take two ounces to the goldsmith,” said Lizzie. “Have him make a pretty pendant from it. Perhaps a moon and stars. Something a Maori girl would like.”

Once Chris had left the cabin, Michael kissed Lizzie, and he did it with tenderness and abandon. For the first time, she felt he was really concentrating on her. It had nothing to do with lust or a replacement for Mary Kathleen. Michael was kissing Lizzie Owens alone. Even as he pulled her close, everything was different than on the ship. Lizzie surrendered for a few heartbeats to her happiness, but then doubts nagged at her again. What had happened? Had she changed or had he? Was it because the gods believed in her? Or was it . . .

“Michael,” she said quietly, pulling back from his embrace. “What, what’s happened? Something’s different. Listen, is it, is it the gold?”

Michael shook his head firmly. “No. No, it has nothing to do with the gold. I’ve made a decision. Much too late, I’m afraid. I should have asked you a long time ago.”

“Asked me what?” inquired Lizzie.

Michael breathed deep. But then, it was simple; it was all so simple. “If you want to marry me,” he said quietly. “I, I love you, Lizzie. Have a long time.”

Lizzie looked at him, pensively. “You’ve had a funny way of showing it until now,” she said. “First I was just a whore to you, then a replacement for your lost bride in Ireland, and all of a sudden, it strikes you that I’m not just a person but also the woman you love. And all this, by coincidence, at precisely the moment I come back with seven ounces of gold. You have to understand why that makes me suspicious.”

Michael sighed. “It has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with the gold,” he said. “I swear it.”

“You don’t need to swear, Michael Drury,” Lizzie said, trying to make her voice sound firm. “You need only tell me one thing: if I marry you now, Michael, can I be sure you won’t call me Mary Kathleen at the altar?”

Michael lowered his head onto her shoulder. It took all his strength finally to lift it again and look Lizzie in the eye.

“Kathleen,” he whispered, “is dead.”

Lizzie was both friend and mother as he wept his eyes out on her shoulder. Later that night, she became his lover. And the name he called out at the climax of his joy was not Mary Kathleen’s, but neither was it that of a whore.

Chris Timlock was happier than he had been in months as he rode Michael’s horse to Tuapeka. Until that evening, he had lost his belief that he could get rich from gold prospecting. First, the claim yielded nothing, and then came his long illness. Chris had been prepared to die in the little gold miners’ town.

Now, though, there was this unexpected blessing, which Lizzie shared so generously with him. If Chris had had enough breath left in him, he would have sung, but he already needed all his strength to ride the vivacious gray. The horse pranced down Tuapeka’s main street. First they rode to the goldsmith’s shop. That had been Lizzie’s request, and Chris wanted to take care of it right away.

The goldsmith, a short, wiry man named Thomas Winslow, managed a small jewelry business next to one of the banks. He did not have many customers; most of the prospectors exchanged their few nuggets into money and scraped together just enough to live. Occasionally, however, someone struck it big, and then he’d craft an ounce of gold into a ring for one of the girls from the taverns or from Janey’s Dollhouse. The business owners and craftsmen who were slowly settling in Tuapeka also ordered jewelry from time to time for their wives. There was enough business that Thomas Winslow could have lived well if he had not hit the whiskey a little too hard. Almost every night, he drank his earnings away in one of the taverns. To afford the occasional girl, he panned for gold himself on the weekend and dreamed of a big find.

Naturally, he was immediately attentive when Chris Timlock laid two ounces of gold on the table. He eyed the fine little platter of gold with desire.

Chris smiled at him guilelessly. “If I could get you to make a pendant out of that, a moon with a few stars around it, or a constellation. Sure, that would be a lovely idea: the Pleiades. And a chain for it, if there’s enough.”

Winslow assured him it more than sufficed—and tried to sound him out about the location of the gold.

Chris was careful not reveal anything. “My partner always believed in our claim,” he said warily. “But maybe it was just luck. When can we pick up the pendant? Next week?”

Winslow nodded, but as he closed his shop door behind Chris Timlock, he shook his head.
Luck?
A one-time largish find and he was already having jewelry made from it instead of taking the money to the bank? Surely, there were men who could do that, but he did not think Chris Timlock and Michael Drury were among them.

The post office was already closed, but Chris had to have the gold turned into money before he could send anything to Ann anyway. Luckily, the bank was still open. Many prospectors took their earnings there every day, since too much was stolen in the camp. Mr. Ruland, the bank teller, kept the bank open after dark, and Chris had to line up to have his small fortune entered into his account.

“What did you just pour out there, Timlock? Just over seven ounces?” The man in line behind Chris had looked at the scale and announced loudly what he had seen.

“A few weeks’ worth,” he said.

Mr. Ruland looked at him, astonished. Of course, the banker had seen Michael there a few days earlier, but after an uncomfortable-looking conversation with Ian Coltrane, he had left before exchanging any gold. Mr. Ruland said nothing; he could keep a secret. It was the right thing for Chris Timlock to deposit the money rather than taking cash. There was obvious greed in the eyes of the men behind him. Ian Coltrane, especially, eyed Chris Timlock with unusual interest. Mr. Ruland shivered. He could not stand Ian Coltrane. Three days ago, the man had sold him a horse, and it was already starting to drag its leg.